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Monday, February 20, 2012

The Mind-Boggling Standards of Modern Catholicism

Steav Bates-Congdon was hired the St. Gabriel Catholic Church of Charlotte, NC in 2004 as music director. Everyone knew he was gay, including the parish. More importantly, they all knew that he had been in a 23 year relationship with his partner Bill, who was also active in the church in upaid positions.

No one in the church was under the illusion that Steav and Bill were anything but a long-term, committed couple. For eight years he served on staff.

After 23 years together Bill and Steav decided to go to New York and get married, and they went to Mexico for honeymoon. When they returned to Charlotte Steav stopped by the church and was given a note by the pastor, Frank O'Rourke. It read: "Employees of St. Garbriel... are expected to live with in the moral tradition of the Church. ...Your civil marriage stands in direct opposition to the teaching of the Catholic Church, therefore ending your employement with us."

Look at the situation more closely. The Catholic Church, which pretends they invented marriage, knew Steav and Bill were a couple in a long-term relationship. That was also contrary to the teachings of the church. They ignored it. Only when the men made a deep commitment to one another did the church act. Steav and Bill apparently were free to fornicate homosexually all they wanted and were in good standing with the church, but the moment they made a marriage commitment they were chucked out. Apparently the sex and such was alright, what offends Catholicism is commitment and love.

I am also baffled that this music director was so easily fired while priests, many of whom were rapists in the literal sense of the word, continued to operate as employees of the church. Not only that, but this church did its best to hide said priests from the law and to cover-up their crimes. That, apparently was not in "direct opposition to the teaching of the Catholic Church" since very such priests were fired. The tactic of the church was to move them to another parish so they could start all over again.

If this O'Rourke fellow only discovered that Steav was gay at this time, I could understand him being consistent and firing the man. But he actually knew quite well that Steav and Bill were a couple for some years.

More bizarrely, O'Rourke was informed of the marriage months before it took place. He was told last June and told Steav "Congratulations, I'm very happy for you. But I can't you give you my blessing." Steav said he didn't expect him to do so. At no time did the priest indicate that Steav would lose his job if he married. Steav says had them been told this would imperil his employment the ceremoney would have been postponed until he retired. But the priest apparently didn't have the decency to tell him that a loving commitment would be enough to get him fired. And, why would Steav assume it would get him fired? After all, the church knew of the relationship and they knew Bill.

The only reason for the firing was the marriage, not the relationship. Of course, this is a sect that thinks no one in the "Holy Family" had sex their entire lives. Yes, Mary, Joseph and Jesus were all supposed to be virgins. This is the ideal family. It is a sect that long thought virgins were more moral than others, that marriage with normal sexual relations was morally inferior to chastity. In their pantheon of womanly virtue chaste nuns come first, widows who have ceased having sex are second, in a distant third are married women who have normal, healthy sexual relations with their husbands. At the bottom are women who have any other kind of sex. This is really screwed up thinking.

The Catholic view of sex is literally perverse and unnatural. It goes against actual human nature. Yet they promote the unnatural state of life-long chastity as the moral ideal. That really has to warp people.